Italy's Meloni says it's a 'positive' trade deal was reached but needs to see details
Washington struck a framework trade deal with the EU imposing a 15% import tariff on most EU goods.
"I consider it positive that there is an agreement, but if I don't see the details I am not able to judge it in the best way," Meloni told journalists on the sidelines of a meeting in Addis Ababa.
Italy is one of the biggest European exporters to the U.S., with a trade surplus of more than 40 billion euros.
The Italian government, led by a nationalist coalition, had urged its European partners to avoid a direct clash between the two sides of the Atlantic.
In a statement, Meloni said that the agreement "ensures stability", adding that the 15% "is sustainable, especially if this percentage is not added to previous duties, as was originally planned."
"We are ready to activate support measures at the national level, but we ask that they also be activated at the European level for sectors that will be particularly affected by US tariff measures," she added.
The statement was also signed by the leaders of the other two coalition parties: Antonio Tajani of Forza Italia and Matteo Salvini of the League.
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The Guardian
a few seconds ago
- The Guardian
Dollar strengthens against euro as US-EU trade deal limits uncertainty
Update: Date: 2025-07-28T13:40:28.000Z Title: US dollar Content: Live, rolling coverage of business, economics and financial markets as European stock market rally fizzles out Jasper Jolly Mon 28 Jul 2025 15.40 CEST First published on Mon 28 Jul 2025 09.08 CEST From 2.55pm CEST 14:55 The has strengthened against the euro in the wake of the trans-Atlantic trade deal, as investors appeared to welcome an easing in Donald Trump's trade war. The euro dropped by 0.7% on Monday, with one euro buying $1.1648. That was a much bigger decline than other currencies relative to the dollar. The pound was down by less than 0.1%, with a pound buying £1.34. The euro's decline came after an initial jump (just before halfway along in the below chart) as trading restarted after the weekend break, when Trump and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen agreed the framework deal. However, investor sentiment quickly shifted to a stronger dollar. The question for investors will be whether that dollar strength will continue: many economists have said that tariffs – essentially taxes on US companies and consumers – will slow economic growth in the world's largest economy. That would weaken demand for the greenback. The dollar has weakened notably over the course of 2025, with a euro buying 13 cents more than it did on 1 January. Dean Turner, chief eurozone and UK economist at UBS Global Wealth Management, said: From an investment perspective, news of the trade agreement is likely to initially play out in foreign exchange markets. This could provide some support to the in the short term as trade uncertainty fades. However, we would view any near-term rallies in the USD as opportunities to fade any strength, preferring to continue reducing or hedging USD exposures. Given the broader backdrop of easing trade tensions, our expectation remains that the dollar will gradually weaken into year-end. 3.40pm CEST 15:40 Donald Trump is answering questions from British media in Scotland. Amid comments on Gaza and immigration, Trump also suggested that US tariffs on pharmaceuticals are imminent. He said the US will be announcing pharma tariffs in the very near future, according to Reuters. It came after some confusion over whether pharmaceuticals will be included in the US-EU trade deal. Trump has claimed that medicines were not included, but European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has said that the 15% baseline tariff agreed with Trump will apply. A senior US official later also said that they were in fact covered by the 15% tariff. Yet the confusion highlights the difficulty that many companies still face in working out what will happen if they export to the world's largest market, despite a 'deal' being agreed. (See also: UK steel imports are meant to attract zero US tariffs, but there has been no sign of that deal being honoured.) 3.33pm CEST 15:33 US stock market indices have risen on Monday at the opening bell on Wall Street – but it is not quite the jump that we saw at the open in Europe. Here are the opening snaps from Reuters: S&P 500 UP 8.37 POINTS, OR 0.13%, AT 6,397.01 NASDAQ UP 62.17 POINTS, OR 0.30%, AT 21,170.49 DOW JONES UP 38.02 POINTS, OR 0.08%, AT 44,939.94 2.55pm CEST 14:55 The has strengthened against the euro in the wake of the trans-Atlantic trade deal, as investors appeared to welcome an easing in Donald Trump's trade war. The euro dropped by 0.7% on Monday, with one euro buying $1.1648. That was a much bigger decline than other currencies relative to the dollar. The pound was down by less than 0.1%, with a pound buying £1.34. The euro's decline came after an initial jump (just before halfway along in the below chart) as trading restarted after the weekend break, when Trump and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen agreed the framework deal. However, investor sentiment quickly shifted to a stronger dollar. The question for investors will be whether that dollar strength will continue: many economists have said that tariffs – essentially taxes on US companies and consumers – will slow economic growth in the world's largest economy. That would weaken demand for the greenback. The dollar has weakened notably over the course of 2025, with a euro buying 13 cents more than it did on 1 January. Dean Turner, chief eurozone and UK economist at UBS Global Wealth Management, said: From an investment perspective, news of the trade agreement is likely to initially play out in foreign exchange markets. This could provide some support to the in the short term as trade uncertainty fades. However, we would view any near-term rallies in the USD as opportunities to fade any strength, preferring to continue reducing or hedging USD exposures. Given the broader backdrop of easing trade tensions, our expectation remains that the dollar will gradually weaken into year-end. 2.09pm CEST 14:09 At lunchtime across Western Europe, stock markets appear to have settled down after the initial excitement of the reaction to the US-EU trade deal. The Stoxx 600, tracking the biggest European companies, is up 0.5%. Germany's Dax index is flat, while France's Cac 40 is up 0.3%. Interestingly, the Italian FTSE MIB in Milan is performing more strongly. The lead riser is STMicroelectronics, up 3% amid a broad move up by computer chip companies. Otherwise, Italian banks appear to be performing well, wikth Banco BPM, BPER Banca, Unicredit and Intesa Sanpaolo all up between 1% and 3%. The FTSE 100 is the worst performer of the big European stock markets (perhaps because it is not directly impacted by the trade deal – and has performed relatively well in recent weeks): it is down 0.2%. US futures also suggest that Wall Street indices will rise at the open in about 90 minutes. S&P 500 futures suggest a 0.2% increase, while the tech-focused Nasdaq is set to rise 0.4%. 1.01pm CEST 13:01 Heineken has said it could brew more beer in the US in order to try to avoid 15% tariffs on EU exports. The world's second largest beer brewer, behind only AB Inbev, said that it the end of uncertainty around the tariff rate – with a threat of levies of up to 30% – was welcome. However, chief executive Dolf van den Brink said the Dutch company would look at the possibility of shifting some production. Reuters reports that he told journalists on Monday: We look at all options from... continuing with our current setup, a more hybrid version, or otherwise. If and when we deem them financially to be more attractive in the mid- to long-term, we would for sure explore them. Investing in breweries in the US would be costly, and would lock the company into producing with higher American labour costs. However, it could be attractive if if believes that the 15% tariffs will be in place for the long term. 12.37pm CEST 12:37 The FTSE 100 hit a new record in the opening trades this morning at 9,169.01 points – continuing the recovery from Donald Trump's trade turmoil in April. London's blue-chip companies have recovered and then some from the pummeling they and businesses around the world received from the trade war uncertainty. However, the index has lost its momentum in the late morning, and is now marginally down for the day. BT Group is the biggest faller, down 3.6%. 12.33pm CEST 12:33 UK retail sales slumped for the 10th consecutive month in July, according to a survey of the biggest shops that underlined the weakness of Britain's consumer spending. A third of retailers said that sales declined in July, according to a survey weighted by the size of the business, according to the Confederation of British Industry, a lobby group – although that was an improvement from the 46% balance who said sales had declined in June. The retailers also reported worse expectations for next month. The last time retailers in the survey reported sales growth was September. Since then the UK economy has struggled, with the economy not helped by the huge uncertainty caused by US tariffs. Data from the Office for National Statistics, this month showed that Britain's official unemployment rate rose to 4.7% in the three months to May, up 0.1% from April to reach the highest level since June 2021. Martin Sartorius, principal economist at the CBI, said: Retail annual sales volumes continued to fall in July, although the pace of decline moderated from June's sharp drop. Firms reported that elevated price pressures – driven by rising labour costs – and economic uncertainty continue to weigh on household demand, which has contributed to sales volumes falling since October 2024. These trends of weak demand and uncertainty were mirrored across the wider distribution sector, with wholesale and motor trades also seeing declining sales. 11.50am CEST 11:50 The UK economy will grow faster than previously thought after a stronger-than-expected start to the year, according to forecasters at EY – although some of the faster growth might have come from companies bracing for Donald Trump's tariffs. The EY Item Club, which tries to mimic government modelling, has upgraded its forecast for UK GDP growth in 2025 from 0.8% to 1%. It said that came from a 'significant increase in business investment, which rose by 3.9% in Q1'. However, this is thought to partly reflect the acceleration of business investment and purchase decisions by some companies in March, ahead of the implementation of US tariffs in April. That increase in business investment may not be sustainable in the second half of 2025, the forecasters said – and they do not expect any growth in business investment during 2026. Anna Anthony, a regional managing partner at EY,said: After a strong start to the year, uncertainty in the global economy and international trade policy has continued to slow momentum. While the agreement struck with the US offers welcome relief to certain sectors and boosts the trading outlook, the UK's access to a key export market is still reduced from where it was at the start of 2025, which is likely to weigh on growth. Business investment is expected to remain modest until 2027 and while interest rate cuts should reduce debt service costs and make financing cheaper, this will take time to materialise. Until then, businesses face a period of international uncertainty, alongside elevated labour and energy costs. 11.18am CEST 11:18 France's prime minister, François Bayrou, has described the EU's trade deal with the US as a 'submission'. Writing on the X social network, Bayrou, who leads France's government and is second only to President Emmanuel Macron, said: It is a dark day when an alliance of free peoples, united to affirm their values and defend their interests, resolves to submission. It is not, then, a rousing reception for the trade deal from EU leaders. However, the leaders are unlikely to try to derail the deal; indeed, complaining about EU policies while quietly accepting them is a well trodden path for leaders of individual countries. 11.07am CEST 11:07 Russian airline Aeroflot has said it cancelled more than 40 flights on Monday 'due to a failure in our information systems', with an unverified online statement claiming it was the result of a hack. The state-owned airline announced the cancellations on the Telegram social network. It did not give a reason for the failures. However, an online statement purporting to be from a hacking group called Silent Crow claimed responsibility on Monday for an attack, Reuters reported. Aeroflot told passengers of cancelled flights at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport to collect their previously checked baggage, and to leave the airport. Reuters again: News outlet Baza reported scenes of chaos at the airport, with logjams forming as passengers queued just to get out. Aeroflot has been limited mainly to internal flights since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, as well as cities in allied countries like Minsk in Belarus. Yet it remains a crucial part of transport infrastructure across the world's biggest country by geographical area. Updated at 11.08am CEST 10.43am CEST 10:43 Also on the automotive chip front, the share price of South Korea's Samsung Electronics jumped 6.8% on Monday after it agreed a semiconductor supply deal with Elon Musk's Tesla. Musk said the companies signed a $16.5bn supply deal. Samsung agreed to allow Tesla and Musk access to the fab to 'maximise manufacturing efficiency' for its newest chip, labelled A16. The deal will be seen as a major fillip for Samsung, which has struggled to keep up particularly with Taiwan's TSMC when it comes to manufacturing the most advanced chips. Samsung agreed to allow Tesla to assist in maximizing manufacturing efficiency. This is a critical point, as I will walk the line personally to accelerate the pace of progress. And the fab is conveniently located not far from my house 😃 10.25am CEST 10:25 It has also been a positive start for European semiconductor companies. A 15% tariff is bad news, but it is not a disaster for the sector – which is crucial to US ambitions to be the world leader in artificial intelligence. No European company is more crucial than ASML, the maker of the advanced lithography machines that use extreme ultraviolet light to etch transistors at the nanometre scale. Its machines are the only ones capable of making the world's most advanced chips. Its share price gained 4% on Monday. STMicroelectronics, which supplies Apple and Tesla, rises 3.1% in Milan, Germany's Infineon, which mainly serves the global automotive market, gained 2.2%. 10.06am CEST 10:06 Germany's car industry lobby group has expressed relief that the EU and US could reach a deal – but they are hardly overjoyed. Hildegard Müller, president of the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA), said it was 'fundamentally positive' that the two sides had prevented further escalation of the dispute started by Donald Trump. However, she added: It is also clear that the US tariff of 15% on automotive products will cost German automotive companies billions annually and place a burden on them in the midst of their transformation. The hit to Germany's carmakers is expected to come through lost sales if they pass the tariffs on to American buyers, or through a hit to their margins if they absorb the cost themselves. Either way though, the tariffs will function effectively as a tax on US consumers, who must either pay a higher price, or else see protected US manufacturers able to raise prices themselves. 9.45am CEST 09:45 The relief for European carmakers is clear. The 15% deal averted a 30% tariff on 1 August. Mercedes-Benz's share price rose 1.8% to its highest since late March, and Porsche gained 1.7%. Volkswagen gained 0.8%, although its gained were limited by a cut in guidance from its premium brand, Audi, which cut its sales forecasts by a further €2.5bn because of the tariffs. Reuters reported: Audi now expects revenue between €65bn and €70bn, down from a previous range of €67.5bn to €72.5bn, and an operating margin between 5 and 7%, down from a previous range of 7 to 9%. Stellantis, a group forged from a mixture of brands spanning from Detroit, to Italy and France, gained 1.2%. 9.21am CEST 09:21 Investors might be cheered, but the reaction this morning from European leaders to the EU's trade deal with the US is decidedly mixed. Hungary's prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has long been one of the most divisive voices within the EU, and he wasted no time in criticising European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for what he described as a worse deal than the UK managed to secure. According to Reuters, Orbán told a podcast: This is not an agreement ... Donald Trump ate Von der Leyen for breakfast, this is what happened and we suspected this would happen as the US President is a heavyweight when it comes to negotiations while Madame President is featherweight. Belgium's prime minister, Bart de Wever, struck a different tone – firmly placing the blame for tariffs on Donald Trump. He posted on the social network X: This is a moment of relief but not of celebration. I sincerely hope the United States will, in due course, turn away again from the delusion of protectionism and once again embrace the value of free trade – a cornerstone of shared prosperity. In the meantime, Europe must continue to deepen its internal market, cut unnecessary regulation, and forge new partnerships to diversify our global trade network. May Europe become the beacon of open, fair, and reliable trade the world so urgently needs. 9.08am CEST 09:08 Good morning, and welcome to our live coverage of business, economics and financial markets. Global stock markets have rallied after the US and EU agreed a trade deal, removing a major source of uncertainty for companies around the world even as it promised a permanent cost to trans-Atlantic goods trade. European stock markets surged on the opening bell on Monday, a day after US President Donald Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, shook hands on a deal in Turnberry, Scotland, on Sunday. Germany's Dax rose 0.8% in early trading, France's Cac 40 gained 1%, while Spain's Ibex gained 0.8%. The FTSE 100 in London gained 0.5%. Asian stock markets also mostly rallied. Australia's ASX200 rose by 0.4%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 0.4%, Korea's Kospi index gained 0.6%, while Shanghai's CSI300 gained 0.1%. However, Japan's Nikkei 225 fell by 1% amid doubts over the details of its own trade deal with the US. The US-EU deal will put a 15% US tariff on most imports from the EU, including cars and computer chips. Steel and aluminium still face 50% tariffs – but only above certain quotas. There are zero tariffs on aerospace parts, some chemicals and raw materials. The EU will also agree to buy $750bn in US energy, and more military equipment – both of which fit with moves since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022. There is good news and bad news in the deal, said Holger Schmieding, chief economist at Berenberg, an investment bank: The crippling uncertainty seems to be largely over. The trade deal which the US and the EU struck in Scotland on Sunday with a 15% tariff on most US goods imports from the EU is bearable for the EU, much more so than the 30% tariff would have been which US president Donald Trump had threatened before. However, the outcome remains much worse than the situation before Trump started his new round of trade wars early this year. The extra US tariffs will hurt both the US and the EU. […] The trade tensions with the US will subtract a cumulative 0.3 percentage points from European and 0.5 percentage points from German growth in 2025 and 2026 taken together. The deal is asymmetric. The US gets away with a substantial increase in its tariffs on imports from the EU and has secured further EU concessions to boot. 11am BST: UK Confederation of British Industry distributive trades (retail) survey (July; previous: -46%; consensus: -26%) 12:30pm BST: Donald Trump press conference in Scotland
The Guardian
a few seconds ago
- The Guardian
The EU has capitulated to Trump. But even this doesn't buy an end to the transatlantic trade war
Surrender is always one way to end a war. The capitulation of the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, to Donald Trump's demands for a grossly lopsided trade deal in which most EU goods exported to the US will face far higher tariffs than US products face in the EU is not only humiliating; it also does not prevent a transatlantic trade war. Indeed, to paraphrase the Prussian military thinker Carl von Clausewitz, it is merely the pursuit of a trade war by other means. After six months of bullying by Trump, the Europeans have acquiesced to a provisional settlement that penalises their exporters and commits the world's largest trade bloc to buying hundreds of billions of dollars of US fossil fuels and weapons for the duration of his presidency, rather than risk the blanket 30% tariffs he had threatened from 1 August. This was far from the zero-for-zero tariff deal that the European Commission pitched at the start of the talks. The 15% across-the-board tariff von der Leyen ended up accepting was worse than the 10% rate – similar to the UK's deal – that Brussels officials thought they had secured only two weeks ago. The deal marks Trump's second humiliation of his European partners in two months, following a Nato summit at which allies yielded to his demands that they spend 5% of their economic output on defence, with 3.5% on core military expenditure. Both were marked by undignified fawning by European officials to the US president's outsized ego, and by their unwillingness to challenge or correct even his most blatant falsehoods during excruciating joint media appearances. The commission president declared that the deal creates 'certainty in uncertain times' and delivers stability and predictability for businesses on both sides of the world's biggest trading relationship, worth $1.7tn. Yet even that claim seems doubtful, since uncertainty remains around the status of pharmaceuticals, which she insisted were covered by the 15% tariff but Trump said would not be part of the deal. Von der Leyen's statement that this was 'the second building block, reaffirming the transatlantic partnership' put a brave face on the fact that it was the second time Trump had wielded threats and bluster to extort protection money from timorous European countries desperate to avoid a complete US disengagement in the face of Russia's threat to the continent. Yet aside from the disadvantages that European manufacturers now face in the EU's biggest export market, it is not clear that the deal will buy an end to transatlantic trade friction, or make Trump take a tougher stance against Vladimir Putin's war against Ukraine. Sunday's meeting at Trump's golf course in Turnberry, Scotland, was a display of raw power. As one wag described it, the commission chief's posture should henceforth be known as 'von der Lying Down'. The optics could hardly have been more humiliating for the representative of 450 million Europeans. Von der Leyen had to fly to Scotland and wait until the president and his son had finished their round of golf, then endure his boasts about the magnificence of the gilded Donald J Trump ballroom in which they met. She sat in silence as Trump claimed that only the US was providing emergency food assistance to starving Palestinians in Gaza, although the EU is the one of the biggest providers of humanitarian aid. She did not challenge his narrative on Israel's months-long prevention of UN food deliveries to displaced people in the war-ravaged region. Worse, she felt obliged to parrot Trump's narrative that EU-US trade was unbalanced and that the objective of the negotiation was to 'rebalance' the relationship, without referencing the large US surplus in services trade with Europe. Neither leader mentioned the EU's digital regulations, which remain a potential landmine in transatlantic relations that could blow up within weeks if the commission slaps fines on US tech giants judged to have breached the Digital Markets Act. Far from bringing peace in our time, Sunday's deal leaves some crucial loose ends that have yet to be worked out, including which tariffs on agriculture the EU drops and whether alcoholic drinks are exempted from tariffs. On steel and aluminium, Trump insisted the 50% US tariff would continue to apply globally, whereas von der Leyen said the two sides would revert to historical quotas at lower tariffs. This was at most a damage-limitation exercise to avoid a bigger immediate hit to European business. 'We should not forget where we would have been on 1 August,' the commission chief said in defence of the agreement. 'We would have been at 30% and it would have been much more difficult to get down to 15%.' The deal appears to protect the interests of German carmakers better than those of Mediterranean food and drink producers, although von der Leyen said she had made clear that some EU agricultural tariffs would stay. What would have been the alternative? Some European officials, especially in France, say the EU should have been tougher from the outset, implementing retaliatory measures as soon as higher tariffs clicked under Trump's 'liberation day' announcement in April and invoking its anti-coercion instrument to threaten action against US services companies and investments in Europe. Brussels was unable to make stronger use of its trade powers because of divisions among the 27 member states, with Germany, Italy and Ireland urging restraint to protect their economic interests, while France and Spain supported a more robust EU stance. The result was a deal that will undoubtedly hurt the European economy – the Axa Group chief economist Gilles Moec calculates that it could knock 0.5% off the bloc's GDP – but averted potential tit-for-tat trade measures that could have exacted a higher price. Europe must now accelerate the conclusion of trade deals with other partners around the world to mitigate the damage from Trump's policies. At best, this humiliation could stimulate the EU to build an alliance of like-minded, rules-based trading nations and blocs without the US. But that would take more courage and more unity than the bloc has shown in handling Trump. Paul Taylor is a senior visiting fellow at the European Policy Centre
Reuters
a few seconds ago
- Reuters
US LNG producers climb as EU agrees to $750 billion in energy purchases
July 28 (Reuters) - Liquefied natural gas developers led gains for U.S. energy companies in early trading on Monday, after the European Union pledged $750 billion worth in strategic purchases as part of a sweeping trade pact. The framework trade deal, which ended months of uncertainty for industries and consumers on both sides of the Atlantic, calls for strategic purchases, covering oil, gas, and nuclear fuel, during U.S. President Donald Trump's term in office. NextDecade (NEXT.O), opens new tab, Venture Global (VG.N), opens new tab, and Cheniere Energy (LNG.N), opens new tab jumped between 3.5% and nearly 7%, with the deal bolstering the prospects for American LNG exporters as they expand to meet growing demand for cleaner-burning fuels. Uranium miner Energy Fuels (UUUU.A), opens new tab rose nearly 4%. The U.S. became the world's biggest LNG supplier in 2023, surpassing Australia and Qatar, as surging global prices fed demand for more exports, due in part to supply disruptions and sanctions linked to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Oil prices , rose over 2%, with the S&P 500 energy sector (.SPNY), opens new tab up 1% The agreement imposes a 15% U.S. import tariff on most EU goods, a softer blow than markets had feared. "Terms of the EU-U.S. trade deal were at the forefront, with the 15% tariff level better than feared (30% was mooted previously)," said Ashley Kelty, an analyst at Panmure Liberum. "This should see less of a drag on industrial activity between the two." Still, Kelty noted the deal could weigh on gas prices. "The demand for the EU to buy more U.S. energy will see more U.S. LNG imports in the future," Kelty said, signalling a potential supply glut.
